


Nico

by Skowronek



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Guardian Angels, Alternate Universe - Human, Angst, Character Death, Comfort, Depressed Nico, Depression, Guardian Angel Hades, Hades' A+ Parenting, Hurt, Injury, London, Nico di Angelo/Percy Jackson(unrequited) - Freeform, Sad Nico, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-11
Updated: 2017-03-11
Packaged: 2018-10-02 17:57:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10223885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skowronek/pseuds/Skowronek
Summary: Wherein Nico's guardian angel is at a loss what to do, and Nico dreams of sweet, cold ocean.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Zeilena](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zeilena/gifts).



> I own neither Percy nor Nico.

**_Nico_ **

_We cannot pass our guardian angel's bounds, resigned or sullen; he will hear our sighs. St. Augustine_

 

Her name, Nico thinks, may be Joan.

She certainly looks like a Joan to him, red-haired, blue-eyed and reading a carelessly folded newspaper. Nico keeps glancing at her because there is nothing better to do, and because Joan, quite bored with her newspaper, briefly locks her eyes with Nico’s. He blinks. She doesn’t check him out, not quite, but seems to appreciate him like you could admire a painting. Somewhat surprised, because what the girl could even see in him, Nico doesn’t really believe it but oddly fascinated,  doesn’t stop looking. Joan glances at him now and then, never as rude as the obvious staring he presents her with. It occurs to Nico that whatever interest the girl can have in him is going to disappear the moment she steps out of the Tube.

 _That won’t do_ , he thinks suddenly and knows that he must act quickly because the girl may leave at the next stop. But the rest of his mind screams at him with a different kind of thoughts, darker and dense like a foggy night, and Nico stays where he is, dumbly watching Joan disappear in the crowd, and eventually returns to his flat, haunted by her eyes which looked almost ocean-like. Almost like Percy’s.

Nico has three problems with Percy’s eyes. To his best knowledge, all of them are insolvable. One, their vividly green-blue shade is something that keeps him awake and restless at nights. Two, Nico desperately wants to keep seeing them everywhere, the same way he needs the air he breathes. Three, he is painfully aware that we won’t ever look in these eyes again because Percy is dead.

*

Guardian angels need no lunch breaks. They float, visible only to beings more ancient and foresighted than humans. _It’s quite convenient_ , Will Solace notices with a profound air of someone who has witnessed all there is to see and has taken time to rethink it. _You can watch over your ward at all times but you don’t experience any physical discomfort._

The mental pain that Will Solace, astonishingly, has been suffering, is an entirely different matter. Never before has the angel felt that you can do more than watch calmly, steer gently and sigh with exasperation. And yet, here he is.

Will Solace believes it must have been a gradual process that has left him emotionally incapable of not sympathizing with his young dark-haired ward. Watching Nico receive the news about the death of the most important person in his life was annoyingly disturbing. Will Solace imagines that was what a wasp sting must feel like.

And then, it got worse.

*

The people who run into Nico in the streets assume he wears black because he is in mourning but they are wrong. Nico wears black because there is no darker colour; and he’s not in mourning. That would be an understatement.

He lives alone, a recluse by choice, in his tiny flat in Soho, and his days are no different from nights because it’s not the light that defines them but despair. No one visits him, not anymore. Not after he told Beth to piss off. Her upset face before she nodded, biting her lower lip, and left, was less difficult to throw out of his memory than Percy’s ocean-like eyes.

Still, it wouldn’t have hurt that much if Percy hadn’t loved her instead.

*

Will Solace floats above the boy and listens and sometimes tries to poke into the right direction, but Nico turns out to be stubborn. So the angel only watches and listens, while his ward broods in silence, as still as a painting, sitting in his bed or watching sci-fi TV shows, four seasons in a row. Sometimes he gets up and wanders around, usually at night, to avoid other pedestrians. Will Solace is then bored, because nothing happens, and a bit unsettled, because he has studied humans extensively and realizes this is not something that healthy humans do.

So when they pass rare passers-by, Will Solace overhears murmurs of conversation about Nico, and takes care to  remember them as a reference.

“Such a troubled boy”, an elderly lady exclaims once, “I wish there would be more light in his eyes”.

*

Nico doesn’t speak to anyone, even to his father. The man is too distant anyway, cold and solemn like an Ancient Greek monument. They have no other family, and Nico is happy to keep himself to himself – as happy as he can even get, which is not much. In the back of his mind, he realizes that it may not be healthy but he is well past caring and feels better wishing to go back in time, save Percy from drowning in that fucking river in his garish blue car, and lecture him on not driving while drunk ever, ever again or else.

And then, always, a thought punches him way to hard: Percy won’t drive, drunk or not, ever, ever again. And there is nothing to add, really. Nothing else.

*

The lady’s words have sparked an idea and Will Solace begins eavesdropping on various humans’ conversation whenever his young ward is mentioned. It is easy when you are invisible, as Will Solace happens to be. He stores in his memory every positive statement about Nico there is to hear.

One time in what Will Solace thinks must be December and people rush so as not to be late with their Christmas shopping, Nico goes to Tesco, alone, for milk and beans, not presents, and his hair is wet and curly with snow. That is when Will Solace realizes what humans mean by _heart-broken_ and observes sadly as the snow in Nico’s hair melts, and Nico’s life melts too.

*

There comes a night when Nico has a dream and Percy is in it. They plunge into the water, keep diving, and Percy repeats something like a mantra. With his mouth open, he looks like a fish, and Nico wants to tell him to stop, to hold his breath, but his own mouth is full of seaweed and he can’t, and Percy swallows the water again and again, and Nico just looks at him and knows what Percy tries to say.

_I wouldn’t love you anyway._

*

Will Solace watches over his ward constantly and remembers well that Nico used to be a carefree kid. He’d play computer games, read _Lord of the Rings,_ play truant to go to the cinema with a group of friends, smoke the very first cigarette in the school bathroom, with the window open. But this boy is gone now and sometimes Will Solace feels that somehow he must have been assigned to another person but his higher-ups failed to inform him and he himself must have missed it. But no, it’s still his Nico, and Will Solace would be a very incompetent guardian angel if he let him suffer.

Fortunately, Will Solace considers himself good at his job. And he has an idea.

He just needs to come up with a way to pull it off.

*

In February, Nico covers all the mirrors because looking at his own face is too painful and too pointless.

In March, his father calls.

“Fiona wants to meet you”, he says without preamble. Nico doesn’t know any Fionas. He figures this one may be his father’s new girlfriend. Not that he cares.

“Alright, father”, he answers, hoarsely, because he doesn’t use his voice often. There is nothing enjoyable about meeting this Fiona, but his father would never allow him to say no. Nico knows that much.

“Tomorrow”, father decides and there is no discussion.

*

In March, Hades, the boy’s father, calls. Will Solace listens but the man doesn’t tell the boy anything nice and the angel would frown if he had any eyebrows.

The lack of eyebrows is more substantial than it seems. It means, by extension, a significant lack of body, which rather limits Will Solace’s options.

There are laws of earthly physics that don’t apply to angels. Like eating lunches or having bodies. Will Solace can push things and inspire people but he can’t create anything material that would last in the human world.

It bothers him quite a lot; he’s come up with a great idea that cannot be wasted, and he has no means of making it true. Fellow angels, when consulted, have no answers for him other than “Sorry, I don’t know” and “Good luck with that”, and Will Solace becomes as unsettled as Nico is lonely.

*

Father orders, so Nico goes. They will meet in an expensive restaurant because God forbid Hades would let his son anywhere something as personal as his home. Nico is used to it though, just like he’s used to dreaming about the green and blue ocean.

London is crowded and rainy, and it is laughably easy to blend in and pretend that nothing hurts. Nico is quite adept at it; he already assumes the mask he needs to put on for Fiona. (No point pretending that father would notice anything out of order. He never does or never cares).

It’s a long walk in the cold dump weather from his place to the restaurant but Nico just lets his legs carry him, without thinking about the destination, through London’s streets that he usually frequents at nights only.

Later, much later, he will think his absent-mindedness was the reason he never spotted the cab.

*

“Hello, Nico”, Will Solace mumbles. He thinks that what he experiences must be guilt and a sense of failure. He’s never felt them before. He’s not sure.

Nico is in coma and Will Solace can hear some doctors shouting about clinical death but what matters now is that in this realm, there are no obstructions. Nico can see Will Solace and Will Solace can talk to Nico, and Nico will not be deaf to it.

“Who are you?” the boy, or his soul, asks. Will Solace sees that his ward is surprised to find his voice – they are two unsubstantial beings floating in a busy hospital, with Nico’s still body below.

“Your guardian”, reveals Will Solace. “Guardian angel”.

Nico frowns. In person, he’s not what Will Solace was expecting; too calm, too focused, too quiet.

“Must be the worst job ever”, he mutters, and that’s so wrong that Will Solace won’t stand it any longer. He floats up to him and conjures the book out of the air, giving it to Nico.

The book resembles a medieval manuscript, with intricate illuminations and cursive writing. There is a major difference, though – it’s faded, not material, not perfect, and doesn’t belong to the world below.

“Read it”, Will Solace almost begs. “It’s for you. What random strangers say about you.”.  He searches for a word but cannot find it. “It’s… nice”.

*

They float in the air, above the hospital room. Will Solace stagnantly regards the silence.

Nico reads.

**Author's Note:**

> I've unearthed this thing this month and thought there's not reason not to post it. Written years ago for a Creative Writing class; it needed some editing but here we go.


End file.
